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Fifteen years ago, one of the finest British players of his generation made his professional debut. The story goes that Gerard Houllier went to watch Liverpool’s U18 team played and promptly picked a scrawny teenager by the name of Steven Gerrard as someone he wanted to put into his first team.

Put that way, Gerrard’s selection might seem fortuitous but people within the game had long predicted that he was going to be quite a player.

“We’re all aware of how many games he [Gerrard] has taken by the scruff of the neck in his career. Well, he was doing that from an early age. Technically his ability was second to none but probably what separates players like him from the rest is that they've got the drive and inner determination to go on where they want to go.”

So says Mike Yates who knows something about Gerrard having grown up playing alongside him in Liverpool’s youth teams.

He might not have joined the club in the easiest of periods but most Liverpool fans will have fond memories of Darren Burgess, the man who served as Head of Fitness and Conditioning between 2010 and 2012. He had previously gone to the World Cup with Australia as their Head of Sports Science of the Football Federation of Australia and fitness coach of the national team, and during his time on Merseyside he further enhanced the fine reputation he built there.

Darren is currently working in the Australian Rules football as High Performance Manager at Port Adelaide Football but, despite the busy schedule, he kindly agreed to answer a few questions about the physical aspect of the development of players.